1. Field
The invention herein disclosed generally relates to semiconductor processing systems in a vacuum environment, and specifically relates to configurations of handling and process chambers for semiconductor processing in a vacuum environment.
2. Description of the Related Art
In a conventional semiconductor manufacturing system, a number of different process modules are interconnected within a vacuum or other environment and controlled to collectively process semiconductor wafers for various uses. The complexity of these manufacturing systems continues to grow both due to the increased complexity of processing larger wafers with smaller features, and due to the increasing possibilities for using a single system for several different end-to-end processes, as described for example in commonly-owned U.S. application Ser. No. 11/679,829 filed on Feb. 27, 2007. As the complexity of a fabrication system grows, it becomes increasingly difficult to schedule resources within the system in a manner that maintains good utilization of all the various process modules. While a part of this difficulty flows from the complexity of the processing recipe itself, another part of the difficulty comes from the differences in processing time for various processing steps. The generally high acquisition and operating costs of production semiconductor vacuum processing systems dictate high utilization of the handling, processing, and other modules within the systems.
Within a family of similar semiconductor products, or within a range of families within a technology, at least some of the processing steps may be commonly applied to all wafers. However, because of the unique processing requirements to achieve the final semiconductor device, sharing common processing steps may be very difficult with fixed processing systems. While it may be possible to share these common process steps by configuring them as separate machines, every machine-to-machine transfer imposes time delays and risks of contamination As a result, duplication of equipment, and the resulting underutilization of the equipment, is a common challenge with semiconductor vacuum processing operation in a semiconductor fabrication facility.
There remains a need for process modules adapted to current semiconductor manufacturing needs, and in particular, for process modules that can help to balance load, increase throughput, and improve utilization within complex processing systems.